No contract for Freeland teachers this year

Published 9:00 am, Friday, December 13, 2013

Freeland’s teachers will not have a new contract this calendar year.

A two-hour negotiating session this week closed with a promise to meet again in January.

“The board of education continues to respect the job that our teachers are doing,” said Matt Cairy, superintendent of the Freeland Community School District. “We’re just trying to figure out what’s fair and best for the hard-working teachers of the school district.”

Sue Rutherford, MEA UNISERV director and chief negotiator for the teachers’ association, came off break for the session but is out of the office for the rest of the year and was not available for comment. Tom Short, a Freeland High School teacher on the team, did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

Teachers have been without a contract since June 30 and are being asked to accept a 3 percent pay cut in ongoing contract negotiations. They have objected in particular to the 15 percent fund balance the district wants to maintain, saying it is too high.

The current budget lists $14.22 million in expenditures but just short of $14 million in revenue, leaving $227,168 to be made up from the fund balance.

Rutherford previously said she was not optimistic about reaching a contract this calendar year unless the district had a different offer from the current one, which reduces salaries and includes no step increases.

The last previous contract negotiation session was Sept. 11. A state-hired mediator has been involved in the last two sessions, at the request of both sides.